How People Watch Online Ads According To Facebook

In the world of mobile viewing, video watching is changing. With social media running the web, video ads have become an essential part of marketing efforts for every business. Facebook conducted an in-depth study on how and when audiences are viewing videos. While we used to consider video viewership online in a much different way than we tracked TV ads, smartphones have changed all that. Audiences are merging their online and offline content patterns and expectations.

Feed

All sizes

Sound optional

Relevant to me

Pro Tip: Use a creative that grabs your viewer’s attention quickly and hooks them to stay. This can be something silly or emotional, text that makes you compelled to finish reading or content that asks you a question. Mobile tends to win this battle.

Stories

Vertical – Fullscreen

Sound on

Organic content

Pro Tips: Get creative and shoot raw footage with a fun narrative. Think messy and real. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes and speak directly to the camera as you go. This is the freeist form of video content and the most forgiving.

Skippable

Horizontal

Sound on

Often skipped

Pro Tip: A viewer can skip after 5 seconds, meaning your job is to grab them in the first 5 seconds of video and hold their attention for even longer. Make sure to create a “hook” exactly at the “skip” point to hold engagement.

Non-Skippable

Horizontal

Sound on

Relevant to what I’m watching

Pro Tip: Like TV, you’ve already got your viewers attention. This is a huge help. Now your job is to create a video that hits the sweet spot (joke, offering etc) at 6-15 seconds.

Live

Horizontal

Sound on

High production quality

Pro Tip: Yup. It’s quick. You’ve got 2 seconds to snag a viewer or they’ll move on. Only use live video if you’re ready to go into full production and have a team behind you to support your efforts in real time.

As you build out your video strategy, it’s essential to understand these trends and use them to your advantage. Let’s recognize that there is not one viewing practice for all audiences and thus not one creation and publication practice for advertisers.

Here are our additional pro tips for your content:

Create videos with the platform in mind. Experiment with your copy to “hook” your viewer when they may otherwise consider leaving.

Grab attention right at the start! Don’t assume any audience will stick around if they don’t understand your intention within the first 2 seconds.

Set watch time goals depending on each publication location. For example, 10 seconds of non-skippable content is easier to reach than 10 seconds on a Facebook Story.

Publish videos multiple times each week in order to ensure you’ve hit your targets and keep your audience intrigued. They see so much content, you need to change it up constantly.

Choose the optimization goals that make sense for each creative. For example, if you’re doing a branding video focus on views.

As Facebook so clearly stated, “ mobile is fast becoming the primary media consumption device, so there’s no time to waste.”